animals

We moved in to our new house (5 acres!!!) in the middle of May. This meant that we didn’t have time to get any gardens ready, but we still did manage to get some things in the ground. PE is working on some lovely permaculture gardens for next spring that we will post pictures of soon! There are already 2 apple trees, 2 pear trees, lots of black walnut trees, and some wild blackberries on our property. Other than that we have a fairly clean slate to work with! As our friends say, we have less work because there isn’t anything to undo :)

After the last post about taking care of our friend’s chickens, the same friend decided that she had the itch to incubate some eggs! She decided that she was going to get Araucanas (they lay light blue eggs) and asked us if we wanted some. We decided that with our new knowledge of how easy chickens can be that we would go for it. We should be getting them sometime in November and are really excited about it! PE junior is also quite excited, he really liked going over and taking care of the chickens (including throwing food down on the ground for them to scratch).

Plant something: 7 tomato plants (from a friend who had extra) using a cool method (direct planting into sod) that some of our favorite CSA farmers taught us! 2 chocolate bell pepper plants and 2 yellow bell pepper plants using the same method. In our fall garden that I made using 3 boards and lots of organic soil (that I bought because I was itching to get things planted!) we have beans, peas, lettuce (several varieties), carrots, radishes, marigolds, and a really small variety of corn. We have 3 whiskey barrels that I planted grape tomatoes (a huge hit with my 2 year old and his friends!), basil (purple and regular), sage, parsley, and spearmint.

Harvest something: Tons of tomatoes, lots of bell peppers, beans, peas, lettuce, radishes, basil, sage, parsley, and spearmint. PE has been experimenting with some hay cutting and putting it up in our small barn.

Preserve something: I did several types of tomato preservation (before we got late season blight ARGH!). A couple of times I made a big pot of tomato sauce for dinner with carrots, zucchini, etc. (from the great farmers market that we have in town) and froze the rest in ball jars for later. I also made salsa and canned it, cold pack whole tomatoes (which I did not like the results of, but I will wait to make a decision if I will do it again until I eat them!) green tomato salsa, and green tomato chili sauce. We went to a friend’s house the day she was working on canning a deliciously wonderful smelling tomato sauce (the kind that baked in the oven for 4 hours!) and helped her so in exchange we got a jar of the sauce. We also made tomato paste using her cool hand powered food mill which she later brought all 3 jars over for us! She calls it PE junior sauce because he was such a good helper making it :) I also went to a friend’s farm with PE and his parents and PE junior and we picked 32 pints of raspberries! So lots and lots of jam in July. It is so good on fresh baked bread. I also made basil olive oil and froze it. The next thing for me is canning all of the pears from our trees! I’m excited to try out some different recipes and figure out what we like. I also need to get the rest of our herbs in and dry them/make something from all of the basil (mmm pesto!).

Waste not: Our usual compost and recycling. We took all of the CFL’s (that we bought we aren’t stealing from the landlord!) from the house we were renting and brought them to our new house. We took the light bulbs from the house here and put them back in the rental house. We are looking forward to having chickens to help with the cleanup of the apples and pears under the trees. For now the bees are in them and the deer come along and snack. The dog also does a great job cleaning up after PE jr. Also using all yard clippings, leaves, etc. on our new garden beds.

Want not: We got a Vermont Castings wood burning stove put in a few weeks ago and are hoping that we can have that be our only source of heat this winter (instead of turning on the propane heater). We also have a great exchange going on with a friend. I babysit for her one day a week when her childcare provider does not work and in exchange she gives us food from her farm, maple syrup that they make, and the latest is firewood. PE goes and uses their splitter and gets wood from their huge pile of wood that they were feeling like they would not be able to get through before it rotted. I also did an order from Raintree, raspberries, blueberries, cranberries, loganberries, gooseberries, and some other things I can’t seem to remember at the moment. We have some decent planting coming up in the next week or two! I have also been working on winter type projects; knitting slippers and scarves, making draft dodgers, and my next project is making corn heating bags.

Eat the food: We made the tomato sauce, and I have grand plans for some stuffed bell peppers. We also have lots of salad and beans. I hardly get the peas inside the house before PE junior is chowing down on them, and the grape tomatoes were his favorite snack this summer. I have been considering a special snack garden for him next year.

Build community food systems: I have already mentioned a couple here (friend with chickens, making sauce with a friend, and the friend who has an established farm that we exchange with). PE is working with people at our church to create an indoor winter farmers market either at our church or another church in town. I have also been going with a friend on some farm tours around the area. I get to see what different people are doing and get some ideas for what we should do around our farm, and also meet some more people who are doing lots of the same things that we are doing. I love that we are not the crazy ones anymore!

That is what we have been up to this summer! How about you?

...Figuratively, that is. We’ve developed a great network of friends in the time we’ve lived in Yellow Springs, including several current or aspiring chicken owners. Given that we plan on roosting some birds of our own in the spring, we jumped at the chance to take care of our friends’ 6 chickens and 2 guineas over Labor Day.

Seriously, can chickens really be this easy? I know it’s supposed to be a breeze, but I spent more time taking care of the three cats of theirs than the birds. Yes, I don’t need to muck out the coop or reroute fencing over the short 5-day period, but it still adds up to less time than a litter box or walking a dog (thankfully, ours self-walks anyway...).

I stop by in the morning to let the chickens out and check food and water levels. Then a first check for eggs in the early evening (our friends’ rule – those who care for the chickens may keep all the eggs), and a return at dusk to close the coop door, check for eggs and feed levels once again, throw some feed on the coops floor for scratch, and that’s it. I envisioned chasing birds back in the coop every evening, but they are well-trained to return at dusk.

It’s certainly given both me and Crunchy confidence that we will be able to manage well come Spring when we start to build our own flock. With my frequent travels for work, we were concerned about the burden on her when I’m gone, but it doesn’t seem as though chickens will be a significant source of stress.

Now, as we start to consider pasture rotation and chicken tractoring, things get more complicated. But I’m coming to realize that some things -- like chickens! -- really do take care of themselves.

The horror stories emerging from Zimbabwe following its economic collapse and hyperinflation may provide a glimpse of one possible future for a post-Peak Oil world. An article published today illustrates how desperate the hunger is becoming inside the country. Keep in mind that the government has taken totalitarian control of all the media and there probably many even more terrible happenings going on.

From the article:

Pets are being slaughtered for meat in shortage-stricken Zimbabwe and record numbers of animals have been surrendered to shelters or abandoned by owners no longer able to feed them, animal welfare activists say.

The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals said it could not feed surrendered animals or find them new homes and was being forced to kill them and destroy the corpses.

Animals, like people, are being hard hit by Zimbabwe's economic meltdown, with official inflation of more than 7,600 percent, the highest in the world. Independent estimates put real inflation closer to 25,000 percent and the International Monetary Fund has forecast it will reach 100,000 percent by the end of the year.

Just for your own personal reference, remember that dogs (and other pets) can eat a fairly varied diet (i.e. don't panic if you run out of Purina).

Who, me? I didn’t eat those strawberries out of your garden!

We will have no trouble feeding our dog after Peak Oil…

The recent pet food scare has led many people to start cooking for their pets. Not surprisingly, pet food companies and veterinarians are warning of the dangers of trying to feed your own pet – the former for fear of profit loss and the latter for liability reasons. However, just as we humans used to be capable of procuring our own food, so too were our dogs and cats.

Granted, there are dangers to avoid when making pet food, but they require either large amounts of a particular item or complete lapse of common sense. For instance, while trying to turn your dog into a vegetarian is possible (with very careful nutritional balance), a meat-free diet causes cats to go blind and eventually die due to taurine deficiency. There are also many foods that pets shouldn’t eat in large quantities. For dogs, these include chocolate, onions, garlic, and macadamia nuts. With the exception of the nuts, the quantities required to do harm are fairly significant: 0.5 lb. chocolate, 1 lb. onions, or 1 lb. garlic for a 20-lb. dog.

Adjusting to life without TV

Trained farm dogs were essential in the past and will be so again in the future. Dogs help with herding livestock, fighting off predators, warning against intruders, and (of course) entertaining the children.

Our dog is a Catahoula (at least in part), although we didn’t know that when we got him from the animal shelter in Florida. Catahoulas are dogs typically trained for herding cattle and wrangling wild boar, and make fabulous hunting and guard dogs. We need to learn how to train him for these sort of activities eventually, but for now our main problem is trying to get him enough exercise with on our small suburban lot – they typically need 1 hour of free running time every day! And when he tries going over the fence at every squirrel and small dog, it’s tough to keep him contained. :)